National Bird Conservation Priorities · 2018. 8. 24. · National Bird Conservation Priorities....
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National Bird Conservation Priorities Counterclockwise from top right: California Quail, Alexandra MacKenzie; American Avocet, Srikanth Vk; Great Egret, Peter Massas; Meadowlark, John Carrel; Wood Duck, Rich L Where we are, how we got here, where we’re going
Transcript of National Bird Conservation Priorities · 2018. 8. 24. · National Bird Conservation Priorities....
National Bird Conservation Priorities
Counterclockwise from top right: California Quail, Alexandra MacKenzie; American Avocet, Srikanth Vk; Great Egret, Peter Massas; Meadowlark, John Carrel; Wood Duck, Rich L
Where we are, how we got here, where we’re going
Presenter
Presentation Notes
This morning’s session will focus on our National Bird Conservation Priorities document. This is a very exciting moment for me, because this is the culmination of more than a year of work to build consensus and develop this document- and this is the formal presentation of our National Bird Conservation Priorities to the community. So in this morning’s session we’ll focus on where we are with the Priorities, we’ll briefly review how we got here, but most importantly, we’ll talk about where we’re going- because now we start the process of using this unified voice to make sure priority conservation is happening.
National Bird Conservation Priorities
Session Overview
North American Bird Conservation Initiative
• Presentation of Priorities Document• 3 Case Studies: How are Partners
Using This Document?• Committee Roundtable
Presenter
Presentation Notes
So, more specifically, I’ll start by presenting the document and reminding us how we got here. We’ll then have some case studies from a few partners- how are we already working with our target audience to guide or support priority work? And we’ll end with a Committee roundtable, where each NABCI partner organization will have a few minutes to mention how their organization is already working on elements of these priorities, but also to highlight how they will use this document to advance these priorities in the future. What I hope to accomplish with this session is to provide inspiration to partners on how they can use this priorities document to advance their priority work, and commitments from partners to use this tool to help elevate our collective priorities.
National Bird Conservation PrioritiesCommunicating about what we agree on
North American Bird Conservation Initiative
NABCI Strategic Plan Actions:• Support, develop, integrate, and promote
priorities of regional, national, and international bird conservation partnerships.
• Facilitate coordinated communication with government leadership about highest priority programs, initiatives, and needs of bird conservation.
Presenter
Presentation Notes
When we started the process of building a list of priorities for NABCI to elevate, there were a lot of questions about why NABCI was doing this and what need we were addressing- so I’m going to give a quick summary of how we got to where we are. Part of NABCI’s role is to help the bird conservation community speak with a unified voice about top priorities that we all agree on. This concept appears in multiple places in our strategic plan, and I’ve pasted two of them here: Support, develop, integrate, and promote priorities of regional, national, and international bird conservation partnerships; and Facilitate coordinated communication with government leadership about highest priority programs, initiatives, and needs of bird conservation. But that’s not necessarily an easy or obvious task.
The Infamous Bird Conservation Napkin Diagram
Presenter
Presentation Notes
How many of you remember the infamous bird conservation napkin diagram? When I started my job, someone- I think it was Greg Butcher- got a really sort of evil and sneaky look in his eye, and said, “Have you seen the bird conservation napkin? This is what you are coordinating!” This was a representation of the bird conservation community and how it fit together. So, I didn’t quit my job, but this was a bit alarming, as you might imagine. The reason this is important here, though, is that it highlights some of the challenges of identifying a short list of priorities that we can all agree on. This level of complexity and this diversity of interests reflects a lot of different opinions and priorities and focuses. How do we make sure that those consistent, cross-cutting needs are getting communicated? How do we help our audience wade through all of these voices to hear the voices that agree?
Presenter
Presentation Notes
We try to do this with some of our national reports- identify priorities that are reflective of broad state, regional, or national interests. We’ve got the bird partnership initiative plans, and we have our State of the Birds reports. But even these documents are huge and quite diverse- some of our past SOTB reports are more than 30 pages and are quite comprehensive. And we had been hearing from some of our partners that what would be most helpful was a short list- something concise, that highlighted just a few top priorities that we all agreed on.
National Bird Conservation PrioritiesCommunicating about what we agree on
North American Bird Conservation Initiative
The Need:Identify a short list of top priorities that NABCI should support, promote, and communicate to leadership and potential partners over the next 3-5 years, to advance NABCI’s vision. Priorities will represent actions that most urgently need to happen AND for which it will be possible to make progress over this timeframe.
Presenter
Presentation Notes
So the need was to Identify a short list of top priorities that NABCI should support, promote, and communicate to leadership and potential partners over the next 3-5 years, to advance NABCI’s vision. Priorities will represent actions that most urgently need to happen AND for which it will be possible to make progress over this timeframe.
National Bird Conservation PrioritiesCommunicating about what we agree on
North American Bird Conservation Initiative
The (Primary) Audience:• Federal leadership• Foundations/funders• Leadership of other (potential) partner
organizations
Presenter
Presentation Notes
The primary audience is federal leadership, foundations and other funders, and leadership of other organizations whose goals may overlap with bird conservation goals but who do not have an exclusively bird focus.
National Bird Conservation PrioritiesCommunicating about what we agree on
North American Bird Conservation Initiative
Why is this important?• Ensure that consistent, cross-cutting
needs are communicated• Provide emphasis to priorities that broad
community supports• Help leadership hear the “voices that are
singing the same song”
Presenter
Presentation Notes
Why is this important? Why do we need NABCI to create this one short unified list when there are already so many lists out there? Well, there are So many different opinions and attitudes and priorities in bird conservation- this unified list will make sure that those consistent, cross-cutting needs are getting communicated. This short priorities document will provide power, or emphasis, to priorities that the entire community supports. And finally, our audience often doesn’t have time or interest to weed through details or read long documents- so this document will help our audience wade through all of the different voices to hear the ones that are singing the same song.
National Bird Conservation PrioritiesCommunicating about what we agree on
North American Bird Conservation Initiative
The Process:• Compiled priorities from State of the
Birds reports and Bird Conservation Partnership Plans (PIF, NAWMP, Shorebird)
• Organized into themes, strategies, actions
• Committee members voted on actions
Presenter
Presentation Notes
We compiled a giant list of national priorities based on all past SOTB reports, which are already meant to be representative across the broad bird community. We went through the PIF plan, NAWMP plan, and the Pacific and Atlantic Shorebird strategies to make sure we had truly captured national level bird conservation priorities. Then we asked our 28 Committee members to vote on the actions we’d pulled from these plans, to ask them which they felt were highest priority for NABCI to communicate, based on these criteria. That voting helped us to see where there was consensus across the bird community.
The Result
Presenter
Presentation Notes
The Result: We now have a short list of priorities that the bird community agrees we should elevate for the next few years- we managed to condense hundreds of pages of priority documents into two pages of text that the community agrees on, which was a pretty big accomplishment.
National Bird Conservation PrioritiesCommunicating about what we agree on
North American Bird Conservation Initiative
Themes• Land and Water Conservation• Research and Evaluation• Engagement and Partnerships• Addressing Threats• Policy and FundingStrategies• 3-6 Strategies under each ThemePriority Actions• 2 Priority Actions per Theme
Presenter
Presentation Notes
Overview of what the brochure is: 5 themes, with 3-6 Strategies condensed across the reports. Each theme highlights 2 priority actions. Actions are meant to be broad enough that multiple partners can play a role, but specific enough to provide some direction on what we need to do.
National Bird Conservation Priorities
What this document IS
North American Bird Conservation Initiative
• Elevation of key priorities that have broad agreement across bird conservation community
• Communication tool for NABCI and partners
Presenter
Presentation Notes
Throughout this process, there has been some confusion and concern expressed about what exactly this document would represent, and how we would present this document to the world, so I want to emphasize what this document is, and what it isn’t. What document is: elevation of key priority actions that have broad agreement across the bird community. This is meant to serve as a strong communication tool for NABCI partners. It can be used as voluntary guidance for partners that are looking for this type of guidance.
National Bird Conservation Priorities
What this document IS NOT
North American Bird Conservation Initiative
• Attempt by NABCI to establish or set priorities for bird conservation
• Comprehensive list of all bird conservation priority actions
• List of actions NABCI itself will implement
Presenter
Presentation Notes
and what document isn’t: an attempt by NABCI to establish priorities for bird conservation- this document reflects priorities gleaned from our vast partnership and works to elevate them. It’s not meant to be a comprehensive list of all bird conservation priority actions; those can be found elsewhere. And it’s not meant to be a list of actions NABCI itself will take on as a partnership, necessarily. We have a strategic plan for NABCI, and while there should be some overlap between these national bird conservation priorities and NABCI’s own priorities, not everything here is within NABCI’s niche.
National Bird Conservation Priorities
Today’s Goal
North American Bird Conservation Initiative
Partners commit to ways they will communicate about Priorities to target audience or otherwise use
Priorities to advance key work
Presenter
Presentation Notes
So I want today to be a bit of a celebration that we got this done- because it was not easy, and it’s a big accomplishment that we did this- but also for us to commit to strategies to move this document forward. The document itself is a tool, not an outcome. So the goal of today’s session is for each of us to commit to ways that we will communicate about these Priorities to our key audiences, or otherwise use these Priorities to advance key bird conservation work.
National Bird Conservation Priorities
Session Overview
North American Bird Conservation Initiative
• Presentation of Priorities Document• 3 Case Studies: How are Partners
Using This Document?• Committee Roundtable
Presenter
Presentation Notes
So back to our overview. Before we get into our case studies, what questions or comments do you have about the document or how to use it?
National Bird Conservation Priorities
Case Studies
North American Bird Conservation Initiative
• National Fish and Wildlife Foundation
• US Fish and Wildlife Service• Bird Conservancy of the Rockies
National Bird Conservation Priorities
Committee Member Roundtable
North American Bird Conservation Initiative
<5 minutes per partner• How is your
organization/partnership already advancing these priorities?
• How will you commit to using the Priorities document?
